Newest state legislature has 3 charged lawmakers

In this Dec. 15, 2012 photo, veteran Illinois state Sen. Donne Trotter speaks during a candidate presentation at the 2nd Congressional District slating meeting in South Holland, Ill. Trotter is one of three Illinois lawmakers facing criminal charges who are scheduled to be sworn in Jan. 9, 2013, in Springfield. Trotter faces gun charges for going through an O'Hare scanner with a handgun. (AP Photo/John Smierciak)
— AP

In this Dec. 15, 2012 photo, veteran Illinois state Sen. Donne Trotter speaks during a candidate presentation at the 2nd Congressional District slating meeting in South Holland, Ill. Trotter is one of three Illinois lawmakers facing criminal charges who are scheduled to be sworn in Jan. 9, 2013, in Springfield. Trotter faces gun charges for going through an O'Hare scanner with a handgun. (AP Photo/John Smierciak)
/ AP

When he took office a decade ago, former U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald's mission was to clean up the corruption-plagued Illinois. The investigations of Blagojevich, Ryan and Smith came under his watch. The state has also beefed up its ethics laws; last year officials abolished a program that allowed lawmakers to award college scholarships.

Authorities in Illinois' largest county say they've also focused efforts on lower level public officials, now that the focus is off governors. Gov. Pat Quinn vowed to keep the office scandal free after Blagojevich, and so far appears to have succeeded.

In 2010, Cook County State's Attorney Anita Alvarez launched a program to fight corruption involving publicly elected officials and public employees. The first sting netted six arrests including school officials. It was dubbed Operation Cookie Jar.

The approach of the program, which now counts 35 arrests, has been to work with police departments and seek out corruption instead of reacting to tips.

"In the past we were more reactive. The cases came in and we were notified," Alvarez said. "Our role is working from the bottom up."

Resources poured into fighting corruption on a federal level are more difficult to gage. Randall Samborn, a spokesman for the Chicago U.S. attorney's office, declined comment.

The Chicago area already has the most public corruption convictions of any federal jurisdiction nationwide, according to a 2012 University of Illinois at Chicago report. Since 1976, that's meant more than 1,500 convictions in the Northern District of Illinois. That includes the 2011 conviction of Blagojevich, who's serving a prison sentence and Ryan, who was convicted of corruption in 2006 and due to be released from prison this year.

Overall, during that time, Illinois has logged more than 1,800 corruption convictions, which is the third behind the more populous California and New York.

Even now, it's far from the only state with current lawmakers in legal trouble.

There's two in South Carolina. Democratic Rep. Harold Mitchell pleaded guilty in November to misdemeanor tax charges and will pay a fine to avoid jail. Also that month, a jury found Republican Rep. Kris Crawford guilty of failing to file past years' tax returns on time and must pay a fine but doesn't face jail time. California's Democratic state Sen. Roderick Wright won re-election despite fighting felony counts of voter fraud and perjury.

Reformers say can't jump to conclusions about the three in Illinois. The charges against Trotter could amount to him forgetting about the gun and those against Ford as an honest mistake, said David Morrison, deputy director of the Illinois Campaign for Political Reform. Smith's trial is in October.